Disclaimer: I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh!, but as long as I'm allowed to write fanfics about it I'm alright with that.

"If you can't love yourself, how in the Hell are you gonna love somebody else?"

RuPaul, RuPaul's Drag Race

Chapter 19

After mulling it over for a month, Mokuba finally decided to follow-up on his gut feeling about Alistair. It was clear to him that Seto, despite what he said, and despite the fact that he was back at work, wasn't alright. Ever since waking up at the hospital his demeanor had completely reverted to how it had been following Gozaburo's death.

He'd dutifully changed the policies that he'd promised he would, and to the relief of everyone much of the hype surrounding the Out Loud article died down, but instead of taking the opportunity to perform more reforms, Seto elected instead to work his way through every department and fire anyone that he didn't consider up to par. To take their places, he instructed the department managers to advertise at the university.

To most people the change in Seto was imperceptible, but Mokuba could tell that though he was up and about and going through all the motions that indicated that it was business as usual, his brother was still not over the loss of Alistair, and he hadn't repaired his Duel Monsters locket either and instead kept it in his wallet for when he needed it to unlock certain doors at Kaiba Corp. Mokuba wondered if he still kept Alistair's picture in it, but didn't dare ask.

At home (when he came home) Seto was completely listless, speaking only when spoken to, and even then only giving short responses.

He spent much of his time at the development lab working tirelessly on the virtual reality pods he'd begun several years previously. They were mostly complete, but he wanted to make sure to tighten up the security and safety features on them after the 'Big Five' and Noah had managed to compromise them twice.

He tested everything himself, spending increasingly longer amounts of time plugged into the system to make sure that there were no bugs.

Mokuba found it troubling, but at first he hadn't been sure what to do about it. After talking to Alistair at the hospital he'd been convinced that he hadn't in fact betrayed Seto, or at least not in the way Seto thought he had. And the fact that he had come at all led Mokuba to believe that he still loved the brunette. The younger Kaiba had had issues with Seto and Alistair's relationship in the past, but he ultimately decided that he'd rather share Seto than have him act the way he had been for the rest of their lives and had therefore resolved to try to prove to his brother that he'd been wrong about what he thought Alistair had done.

He'd thought about going directly to Alistair, but had decided that would be a bad idea; there was no way Seto would agree to talk to him, and even if he tricked him into doing it he wouldn't listen, so he'd decided to talk to the reporter girl instead to find out what she had said to Seto and how she knew about it.

Getting her address had been easy, and this was the day he was going to go talk to her.

Britney was more than a little surprised when she opened her door and saw Mokuba Kaiba standing on the doorstep.

"Hi," she said awkwardly, not sure how to address him since 'Mokuba' seemed too familiar, but addressing him as 'Mr. Kaiba' seemed far too bizarre given that he was easily five years younger than her and still a kid.

"Hi Miss Whinnery," Mokuba replied. "Could I come in for a minute?"

"Um…sure." She opened the door a bit wider and stepped aside to allow him to enter the apartment. "Can I ask what this is regarding?" she asked after sitting him down on her and her boyfriend's couch and offering him a coffee.

"It's nothing official," Mokuba said quickly.

"Oh." She would have asked him how his brother was, but decided that might be too invasive of a question, especially since it easily could have been her magazine article that had landed him in the hospital in the first place. When she'd first heard that Seto Kaiba had slit his wrists she'd felt horribly guilty. While she did believe in social justice, the whole 'Operation Kaiba Corp' had been more or less a game to see if she and her friends could stir up some trouble for them; she'd never imagined that it would have the impact that it had, and she definitely would have reconsidered the whole thing had she known how deeply it would have cut the young CEO.

"I just want to know what you said to him at your meeting. He won't talk to me about it and I'm worried about him." She felt an immense sense of relief. This wasn't about her article after all—it was about Darren.

"I didn't really say anything to him. But if you want to know what my friend told him you'd have to ask him; I wasn't in the room."

"Your friend…Darren Wiley, right?" She nodded.

"And look: I didn't want him to tell your brother that we knew about Alistair; I thought that that would be inappropriate, but Darren didn't listen to me. He told me that he didn't like Kaiba's attitude and to wipe the smirk off his face he revealed that he knew about that, but I'm sure he wouldn't have said anything if he would have known what would happen," she added quickly.

"I believe you," he said after thinking it over a moment. "Could you tell me how I could get in touch with him?"

"Of course."

After leaving Britney's house, getting back in the car and telling Alfred to drive him to Eska Uedo's office, Mokuba immediately called his brother's lawyer.

"I need to speak to Mr. Uedo right away," Mokuba told his secretary. "Tell him it's Mokuba Kaiba."

"Mokuba?" Uedo said after taking the call. "Did Mr. Kaiba and I have a meeting scheduled?" He sounded nervous.

"No. In fact, he doesn't even know I'm calling."

"What can I help you with?"

"Could you have a confidentiality agreement drawn up for me?"

"Of course, but why?" Mokuba didn't want to talk about it in front of Alfred, so he said:

"We can go over the details when I get there. I'm on my way to your office. Do you have time for me now?" Uedo knew that he had an appointment soon, but Seto Kaiba was his most important client and he couldn't risk damaging their relationship by denying his brother face time.

"Absolutely."

"Good. I should be there in ten minutes."

Upon arriving, Mokuba was escorted to Mr. Uedo by his secretary who looked like she could be Mai Valentine's older sister.

"Sorry for springing this on you out of the blue," Mokuba apologized, taking the seat in front of Uedo's desk.

"Not a problem," Uedo replied, flashing his overly bleached teeth. "I have the forms pulled up, so I just need you to give me a few details."

Over the next forty minutes Mokuba specified the parameters of the agreement. Finally, Uedo printed and signed two copies of the document, but stopped Mokuba before he could follow suit.

"With all due respect, if I understand what you told me correctly, by interrogating this young man under the protection of this agreement you would ruin the chance for Mr. Kaiba to sue him for damages."

"I know my brother and he wouldn't want this information to go to court, believe me." Uedo was deeply curious to know what it was that the Kaiba brothers were working so hard to keep secret and wondered if it had anything to do with what caused Kaiba to attempt to commit suicide, but his professionalism prevented him from asking.

After their first few sessions (which had been a complete waste of time in Seto's opinion), Dr. Coleman had become much more direct with her questions, sensing that her usual gentle prodding was only serving to close Seto off further. He appreciated the change. He loathed having to go see her, but the visits were made slightly more bearable without her metaphors, loaded questions, and head games.

"We've talked about a lot of stuff," she commented, eliciting a smirk from Seto. 'Talked' implied that it had been a two way street when for the most part he'd either said nothing at all or fed her the crap he knew she wanted to hear. "We've touched on your parents, your relatives, your Duel Monsters career and your brother, but today I want to talk about something completely different."

"Oh joy." He rolled his eyes.

"First of all: did you try out any of the things we talked about last time?"

"Yes, I did. But only because I had to."

"You don't have to do anything."

"Yeah right. Anyway, I tried playing a non-competitive game. I put a puzzle together."

"And?"

"It was boring."

"And what about the team game?" He thought back to the tedious game of two on two basketball he'd played with Roland, Saito, and Kanzo two days previously. Since he'd been younger than all three of them by at least ten years he wasn't sure it really counted since he hadn't needed Kanzo in order to win, but he wasn't going to tell her that.

"Basketball. And let's just say that I don't think I'm cut out to be a 'team player.'"

"What was it that those two games lacked for you?"

"Putting a puzzle together is pointless. It doesn't take any skill whatsoever; a child could do it. And as for basketball: while the game itself could be interesting, I didn't like it because no matter how well I play, if my teammates screw up we all lose the game."

"A puzzle may not require skill, but didn't you at least experience some kind of satisfaction after you completed it?" He would be lying if he said no. The puzzle had been comprised of two thousand pieces which, when combined, formed an image of the Blue Eyes White Dragon. Upon putting the final pieces in place after laboring over the puzzle for over an hour and a half, he'd looked down on the completed picture with a twinge of pride at having created order out of the chaos. The completed puzzle was still lying on the floor in the drawing room.

"It was boring, like I said."

"But surely finishing a new invention, like the remarkable jet-pack you told me about, must fill you with some kind of satisfaction."

"That's different."

"But it's not competitive."

"Look: I never said that everything I do has to be competitive or else I don't care about it, you did. I could have told you that and spared myself from such a pointless task!"

"The purpose that puzzle served was to show you that the same fulfillment you feel after completing a project can be found in other areas of your life that aren't related to work. As far as playing a team sport-."

"You wanted to show me that being part of a team can be just as gratifying as working alone," he cut her off. "Well, it didn't work; I still hate the idea of teamwork. The only person I can rely on is me. I want my victories to be mine, and I want my failures to be mine. End of story."

"That leads nicely into what I wanted to discuss today."

"Oh really?"

"Can you think of any exception to your general 'anti-teamwork' policy?" He could tell by the tone of her voice that he wasn't meant to have an answer and he was nettled to discover that he didn't. He sighed in irritation, suspecting that she had some kind of 'outside the box' response.

"No."

"What about love?" He hadn't expected that and found himself unconsciously tightening his jaw. He did not want to talk about that.

"What about it?" She mentally noted his complete change in demeanor. Before, he'd been very blasé, almost uninterested, but at the mention of love his relaxed posture had gone rigid and his eyes had hardened. She knew she'd have to tread lightly.

"You tell me. What do you think about it?"

"I think it's pathetic and useless!" he spat before he could stop himself. "And anyone who believes in it is a fool!" She tactfully remained quiet and allowed him to continue to rant. It was the first uncalculated response she felt she'd gotten from him the whole time they'd been seeing each other. It led her to believe that they were at last getting to the heart of what had led Seto to slit his wrists that night, and perhaps also to who the person the CEO had referred to in his suicide note; the one he'd claimed was not the reason he wanted to end his life, was.

"Love is for losers who can't make it through life on their own and need someone else by their side in order to validate their own self-worth!

Love is a lie since no one actually really does love anyone else: they just use each other but call it love in order to romanticize their selfishness!" He clenched his fists as he thought about how Alistair had used him in order to make himself feel better about the death of his family. "I would never waste my time on something like that," he finished, glaring at his own fists as more memories forced their way to the front of his mind. At least, not again, he added to himself.

"That's a pretty extreme position." Seto suddenly remembered where he was and quickly shrugged his mask of indifference back into place.

"I'm an extreme kind of guy."

"Can I ask you something?"

"That's your job, isn't it?" She decided to switch topics.

"Do you believe in hate?"

"Of course." He narrowed his eyes in an attempt to pinpoint the relevance of the question and he decided it was a deflection tactic. An attempt to lull him back into a chatty mood.

"Do you hate anyone?" His thoughts immediately went to Gozaburo, but he refused to talk to her about him. However, he couldn't really say 'no' without having to deal with a bunch of naggy follow-up questions so he cast around for a scapegoat.

"Yeah."

"And why do you hate this person?"

"He's a loudmouthed jumped-up deadbeat who relies on luck and his more talented friends to get himself through life, yet he has the audacity to walk around with his head held high as though he isn't in fact a worthless mutt that society could do without." Ridiculing Wheeler had, since they'd first crossed paths, become a guilty pleasure of his, so using the blonde as a means to avoid talking about Alistair or Gozaburo was fine by him.

"That certainly doesn't sound like a very pleasant person, but why do they bother you so much personally?" Every once in a while Dr. Coleman asked a question that actually made him think, and this was one of them. Why did Wheeler and his stupid happy-go-lucky attitude get under his skin so much? All he knew was that every time he saw him he wanted nothing more than to tear into his self-esteem until he reduced him to a puddle of self-loathing.

Why did Wheeler get to be happy? He hadn't earned it. His life had been easy thanks to his stupid group of friends always babying him.

No one had ever done that for him. He had earned everything he had through hard work and perseverance and never once relied on luck, yet even though he had done more than Wheeler ever would, he was unhappy whereas Wheeler always, despite all the insults he had thrown at him, had a smile on his face.

One incident stood out to him in particular: their unofficial duel after his humiliating loss to Yugi in the Battle City semi-finals. He'd been so angry throughout that whole duel, the sting of his defeat still fresh. But what had gotten to him more than that, was how carefree Joey had seemed despite having lost his own shot at victory, even going so far as to say that Seto was taking their match too seriously and that he ought to try to have fun instead of focusing on winning.

Seto had blown the statement off, as he always did, but it had really pissed him off. Wheeler should have been completely crushed after Seto wiped the floor with him, but he hadn't been. Even though he'd emerged from that duel the victor, Seto had walked away feeling like a loser thanks to Joey's genuine good sportsmanship.

"I hate him because despite the fact that he's all the things I said before, and that in a few years no one will even remember his name, he's content. He knows that he's nobody and he doesn't care. I have everything and he has nothing and yet he's happier than me!" He almost added 'it's not fair', but stopped himself short of actually saying something so childish.

He knew that by telling Dr. Coleman all of this he was giving in, but he didn't care anymore. He was sick of their game of cat and mouse; of always trying to dodge her probing inquiries in order to maintain some level of control. She already knew that he wasn't perfect, the whole world did at this point, and he thought that maybe, possibly, she could help him. If he was going to be forced to live anyway there wasn't any harm in trying to make his life a little more bearable. Didn't he deserve at least that much after everything he'd been through?

"Do you want to be happy?" He was silent for so long she was sure he wouldn't answer, but then he met her eyes, his strikingly blue irises seeming to pierce right through her.

"Yes."

The conversation went much more smoothly after that and for the most part he gave her real answers, though he stopped short of divulging anything he found to be too personal. She was grateful that he was finally willing to talk to her because she did feel as though she could help him; she'd already made several conjectures that his words were now confirming. Because of his unhealthy fixation with winning she'd assumed that he had probably been pushed by either his biological parents, adopted father, or both, to always be the best and told that anything less wasn't good enough. The fact that he'd been cutting himself for some time supported this theory.

His line about only being able to depend on and trust yourself seemed equally likely to come from one of his parents given that he didn't appear to actually feel that way, particularly with regards to his brother.

"Before you go I just want to touch on one more thing."

"What?" he asked warily.

"Clothes."

"Clothes?"

"They say a lot about a person, wouldn't you agree?"

"I suppose."

"What do you think your style says about you?" He glanced down at his usual all-black ensemble, black boots, his gauntlets, and his white trench coat.

"That I have good taste and don't want to look like anyone else." She eyed the spiky straps on his boots and shirt, the hard metal of the gauntlets, and the studs on the collar of his jacket.

"If I saw you walking down the street and someone asked me to describe your clothes I think the word 'armor' would come to mind. Do you agree with that?" He thought about it. As soon as she said it, he knew exactly what she was talking about.

"I wear these," he tapped one of the gauntlets, "so that my shirtsleeve can't roll up and reveal the scars on my wrist."

"Very practical," she agreed. "What else? Do you think that you look approachable?" He almost laughed since the last word he would have used to describe himself would have been 'approachable.'

"Probably not."

"Well your jacket would make it pretty difficult to stand right next to you, wouldn't it? It kind of keeps people at a distance, doesn't it?" Again he felt that she'd made an interesting point.

"Most of the time."

"I think you get where I'm going with this. This physical barrier that you've put around yourself, this armor if you will, represents the mental armor you have up, warning everyone to stay away. And they do, don't they?"

"For the most part." She looked at him expectantly. "There is one person who, no matter what I say, calls himself my friend."

"Why do you think he does that?"

"I have no idea." He'd never understood Yugi's determination to befriend him. "I've hardly done anything nice for him."

"You must have if he considers you a friend. We're out of time for today, but think about it and we can pick this back up next time. If you're such a horrible person, why would he want to be your friend despite having already been rebuffed by you?"

As he was driving to Kaiba Corp headquarters, Seto pondered the question he'd been posed. Why did Yugi insist that the two of them were friends? He was nothing like the members of the Geek Squad. He wasn't a cheerleader or a team player. He didn't even particularly like Yugi, though he did respect him, but clearly Yugi saw something in him that was likeable, else he wouldn't insist on calling him a friend. What was it that Yugi could see in him that he couldn't even see in himself?

Author's Note: One of the things that I find really annoying about love stories is that both character's happiness always seems to depend on each other. I think that Seto deserves a little better than just that. I want actual happiness for him, happiness and self esteem that come from within himself, not from someone else.

Also: I took the opportunity to include one of my main headcanons. I think that Seto was so quick to look down his nose at Joey and take every opportunity to ridicule him because he was secretly jealous of him to a certain degree.